General Hospital’s Van Hansis On Lucas & Britt’s Fiery Relationship And Bond With Kelly Thiebaud (Excl)
On General Hospital, Lucas Jones and Britt Westbourne have a scratchy history, to say the least, stemming from Britt’s infamous embryo theft whereby she gave birth to the biological son of Lucas’s cousin, Lulu, and passed the child (Rocco) off as her own — and even worse, Britt had sucked her BFF, Brad Cooper, into her scheme, causing major trust issues in Lucas’s romance with Brad, who he later married and divorced. Van Hansis, who took over the role of Lucas last year, didn’t get to play the original on-screen friction between his character and Kelly Thiebaud (Britt), but he’s been having a blast working with her since she returned to the show earlier this year.
Instant Connection
To hear Hansis tell it, he took an immediate shine to Thiebaud when they met at the GH studio. “There are some people that you meet that you just click with; you’re just like, ‘Oh, we’re friends, that’s it.’ She was very much that for me, from the very first conversation we had. Right away, I was like, ‘Oh, I dig her. A lot.’ She is so funny — she kills me with how funny she is — and there is just something about her where, from day one, I was like, ‘Yep, I get you and I think you get me.'”
Which makes it all the more enjoyable to slip into character and, as Lucas, give Britt a hard time in nearly all of their interactions. “Working with her is just so much fun and the Lucas/Britt dynamic is a favorite of mine to play,” Hansis says. “They have sort of a playful antagonism that I love. Granted, I think they really don’t like each other, which is especially fun to play when you’re doing it with somebody who you really do like!”
“Another thing I love about working with Kelly,” the actor continues, “is that she’s completely unafraid to make a fool of herself. There is no pretense with her. There was some scene I did with her where I had to call her a psychopath, and she pulled this crazy face and made this weird sound and I was like ‘This is art!’ We were working together the other day and she had to have a reaction to something and she was like, ‘I’m just gonna do it, I’m just gonna go for it,’ and she just went for it! It was so, so funny.” Maybe a little too funny, the actor recalls with a chuckle. “[On set] they were like, ‘That’s great, Kelly — you just gotta take it down like 50 percent!'”
On the December 11 episode, Lucas surprised Britt by offering to write a recommendation on her behalf as she works to get her medical license reinstated, but Hansis isn’t necessarily rooting for this to be a turning point in the duo’s relationship when they make such entertaining enemies. “I think Britt and Lucas maybe get some enjoyment out of ripping into each other and being snarky with each other,” he offers. “And it’s certainly very fun to play!”
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